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Is Executive Hubris Ruining Companies?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the leave-it-to-the-PHBs dept.

Crash McBang wonders: "In a recent IndustryWeek article, Mathew Hayward, assistant professor at the University of Colorado, does a Q&A on his new book, "Ego Check: Why Executive Hubris Is Wrecking Companies And Careers And How To Avoid The Trap", which shows how executives' inflated egos can impact what they choose to produce, the manufacturing decisions they make and how they market their products. What failures (colossal or otherwise) have you been involved in that could be attributed to Executive Hubris?"

5 of 94 comments (clear)

  1. That's not what's ruining companies by Kris_J · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What's ruining companies is upper management's pathological inability to make a fucking decision.

  2. Is Programmers' Hubris Ruining Companies? by rice_web · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "In a recent IndustryWeek article, Mathew Hayward, assistant professor at the University of Colorado, does a Q&A on his new book, "Ego Check: Why Programmers' Hubris Is Wrecking Companies And Careers And How To Avoid The Trap", which shows how programmers' inflated egos can impact what they decide to produce, when they will produce it, and in what language and with what buzzword they will create it in. What failures (colossal or otherwise) have you been involved in that could be attributed to Programmers' Hubris?"

    --
    The Political Programmer
    1. Re:Is Programmers' Hubris Ruining Companies? by khallow · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I suppose the exercise is insightful, but programmer hubris is curable. You can always fire them or (in less enlightened parts of the world) just take away their computer. Executives have more power, can do more damage, have access to far more of the business's resources, and are more often not monitored or audited properly.

  3. Authority != Experience by svunt · · Score: 4, Insightful

    My own experiences with hubris in management mostly consists of newcomers in high positions thinking that some management experience meant that they knew every industry better than those non-executives with 30 years experience. Being able to spell KPI does not an expert make! Humble (and goo) managers spend their first few months (at least) learning about the industry & company they're in. The rest come in and start hiring, firing, spending, slashing, basically making a lot of 'impact' without the first clue about the consequences. This is called "being pro-active"

  4. Re:GEC/Marconi by jimicus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Unless you're an old boy yourself. If memory serves, the folk running the business were paying themselves a small fortune and amassing nice big pension funds.